This Shadow Hanging Over Me
by HilaryHilary
Summary: James Potter can't reconcile with his feelings for his best friend. He can't interpret their touches, the feelings between them. Or maybe he just doesn't want to. JamesSirius, slash.


This Shadow Hanging Over Me

There are some things that James Potter instincitvely understands.

Things like Lily Evans. Lily likes his teasing but will never admit to it. Underneath all her superiority, she is really just a teenage girl, like any other, who likes teenage boys like any other. In general, James has no problem understanding girls.

This is why he always gets them.

There are other things, like school. Charming will get you far, and doing your homework will probably get you farther. And parents, who like to think they know what's going on in your life so they can feel involved, even when they aren't. In Quidditch, in school, in life, James knows he will always be the best.

But then there are the gray areas.

Somehow, over the years, his friends have become more important than his girlfriends, his school work, his pastimes. Not friends. Just one. Friend.

Sirius Black.

James can't begin to describe their relationship, mostly because he doesn't want to. He doesn't want to face up to the fact that he is clearly, irrevocably, infinitely closer to Sirius than he could be to Lily or to any other girl. His friendship with his best friend had ruined him. It had showed him how life could be without the restrains of school, girls, life. It had showed him how he could be.

It wasn't hard to love Lily. And a part of him truly did. But the way Sirius understood him, the way Sirius laughed at his stupid jokes, the way Sirius refused to worship him as the rest of the school did. It enchanted him.

He had known Sirius his entire life. It seemed like they'd been together forever, since the days when they'd played on their famillie's estates and refused to share their toys. Nothing had changed in Hogwarts. They'd let people flock around them, be their friends, but it had begun and ended with them. No one had ever entered their inner circle. No one ever could.

Some days he's absolutely certain that Lily is his true love. He thinks of her long red hair, her big green eyes, the way they flash when she's furious with him. The face he puts on for her is not entirely false, and is somewhat worthwhile.

There's only one person in the world who he doesn't need a face for. He hates that it means so much to him.

Besides his consuming thoughts, his hidden desires, there's very little to solidate their relationship. Mostly drunken kisses. Everyone gets a free pass while being drunk. Guys always hope that girls will get drunk and make out with each other in front of them. James pretends to hope for this, too.

But what he really hopes for is a confusing, exhilerating few minutes alone with his best friend in the dark. These moments are tortorous, painful, and confusing. And in the morning, they both pretend they've forgotten. Always.

It's not like he's _gay_, he's always quick to remind himself. It's just that he's close to his friend. That he wants to be closer, because girls, on the whole, have never done lot for him. It's not like there's anything wrong with that.

But he doesn't need to defend himself. No one suspects. James Potter is perfect.

Sometimes he wants to say – no, he wants to scream it – that there's nothing wrong with it. That it's a part of him. That he's not going to change, and this is how he wants to live his life. With him. With matching jogging suits for when they get older. Okay, maybe not that exactly.

He does live his life with him. They sleep on beds beside one another, they eat their food at the same long table in the Great Hall. Remus and Peter hover somewhere in the outer realm of their friendship, a thousand years away from them but closer than anyone else.

James looked up in surprise as Sirius entered, banging the door of the room behind him, shocking him out of his reverie. He attempted a smile.

"Having deep thoughts?" asked Sirius jokingly, rummaging through his trunk. James shook his head, wondering what Sirius would say if he told him the truth. It would be almost worth the reprucussions to find out.

"You know. Lily stuff," explained James.

"I do know. You never shut up about it, you lovesick pratt," said Sirius. James good-naturedly lobs a pillow at him, which he dodged.

"You don't like Lily," observed James, not caring whether or not his friend responded. It's the truth, whether Sirius admits it or not. He doesn't like Lily, or what she stands for. He doesn't like her biting tounge and her shining green eyes. Maybe, just maybe, he's jealous of all these things.

"Did you do the homework for Herbology?" asked Sirius. James nodded and fished a roll of pachment out of his own trunk. He handed it to Sirius. Their hands brush as he does so. James pulls away first. Pretending to scorn the touch of males is a trademark of being a teenage boy.

James reminded himself that he was normal. It wasn't like he'd dressed himself up in his mother's clothes when he was a child, or said things like "fabulous", or wore stylish clothes. He was just a boy who preferred his best friend's touch over Lily Even's smile.

What was so wrong with that?


End file.
